Palace of Versailles Tickets 2026: Prices, Skip-the-Line and How to Visit from Paris

Everything you need to know before you go — from skip-the-line Passport tickets to the Hall of Mirrors, the gardens and the RER C from Paris.

What Does a Versailles Ticket Actually Include?

The standard Passport ticket covers the Palace (with a 30-minute timed entry slot), the Estate of Trianon, Marie Antoinette’s estate and the Gardens, plus the Musical Fountains and Musical Gardens shows on event days. The room everyone comes for — the Hall of Mirrors — is included in every ticket that covers the main palace; you don’t need a separate ticket for it.

The Gardens are free to enter on most days. The exceptions are the Musical Fountains and Musical Gardens days (Tuesdays, Saturdays and Sundays from April to October), when a €10 Gardens supplement applies — and the Passport already covers it on those days.

Sold as cheaper, narrower alternatives: the Palace-only ticket (main building, no Trianon) and the Estate of Trianon ticket (Grand Trianon, Petit Trianon and the Queen’s Hamlet, but not the main palace). One thing applies to everyone — including under-18s and EU residents aged 18–25 who enter free: you still need a reserved timed Palace slot, booked online in advance.

Versailles Ticket Prices & Tour Options

Every ticket that covers the main palace includes the Hall of Mirrors. The official adult Passport is €25 in low season (Nov–Mar) and €35 in high season (Apr–Oct and fountain days); EEA residents pay €22 / €32 with ID, and under-18s plus EU residents aged 18–25 enter free with a reserved slot. Resale platforms add a small fee for flexible times and availability when the official site is sold out. Here’s how the main options compare:

Starting prices for resale platforms; they vary by date and availability. Note that no ticket — official or resale — lets you skip the mandatory security screening at the entrance.

There’s no single “best” Versailles ticket; it depends on your budget, how much time you have, and whether you want guidance. Here’s a quick breakdown of the four main options:

One practical note: the estate is huge. The signposted palace route alone is about 90 minutes to two hours, and the gardens cover 800 hectares — most visitors easily walk 8–10 kilometres over a full day. Plan your priorities before you arrive: the Hall of Mirrors and State Apartments first, then the gardens, and the Trianon last if you still have energy.

The Hall of Mirrors and What to See Inside

The signposted route through the main palace takes most visitors about 90 minutes to two hours. The Royal Chapel is the first major space — completed in 1710 and the setting for the marriage of the future Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette. The State Apartments are a sequence of seven rooms, each dedicated to a Roman god, built to impress visiting ambassadors. The Hall of Mirrors is the centrepiece: 73 metres long, lined with 357 mirrors facing 17 arched windows, where the Treaty of Versailles was signed in 1919. The Queen’s Apartments include Marie Antoinette’s bedroom and the secret door she used to escape on the morning of 6 October 1789, and the visit ends in the enormous Gallery of Great Battles, thirty-three paintings covering fifteen centuries of French military history.

A few things worth knowing before you go:

• 📷 Photography is allowed without flash in all interior rooms. Tripods, selfie sticks, monopods and drones are not allowed.
• 👗 No strict dress code, but the marble floors are hard and you’ll walk a lot — comfortable shoes make a real difference.
• ⏰ Timing matters. The Hall of Mirrors is almost empty between 9:00 and 9:45 am and fills up fast after 10:30. The first hour after opening is by far the best.
• 🎧 An audioguide is included with the Passport — genuinely good if you’re visiting independently.

The Gardens and the Estate of Trianon

The 800-hectare gardens, designed by André Le Nôtre in the 1660s, are arguably more impressive than the palace itself. Entry is free most of the year — except on Musical Fountains Show and Musical Gardens days (Tuesdays, Saturdays and Sundays from April to October), when the fountains run to music and a €10 Gardens supplement applies (covered by the Passport on those days).

A 20-minute walk — or a few-euros shuttle train ride — from the back of the palace brings you to the Estate of Trianon, the most peaceful and least crowded part of the estate. The Grand Trianon is a pink-marble retreat Louis XIV built to escape the formality of the court. The Petit Trianon became Marie Antoinette’s private domain in the 1770s. Just beyond it is the Queen’s Hamlet, a mock village of thatched cottages, a working farm and a windmill — the closest thing eighteenth-century French royalty ever built to a leisure park.

🎟️ Combined day trip on Tiqets
Versailles & Monet’s Gardens in Giverny — Day Trip from Paris
A long but well-organised full day combining Versailles in the morning with Claude Monet’s house and water-lily gardens in Giverny in the afternoon — round-trip transport, guide and reserved entry included.

Opening Hours & Best Time to Visit

The Palace is open from 9:00 am to 6:30 pm (last admission 5:00 pm). The Estate of Trianon opens later, from 12:00 noon to 6:30 pm. The Gardens are open daily from 7:00 am to 8:30 pm (April–October) or 8:00 am to 6:00 pm (November–March). The Palace and Trianon are closed every Monday, plus 1 January, 1 May and 25 December; the Gardens stay open year-round except those three holidays.

In terms of timing:

• 🏆 Best overall: arrive before 9:30 am on a Wednesday, Thursday or Friday. The Hall of Mirrors is almost empty in the first 45 minutes.
• ✅ Good seasons: November to March — emptier rooms, low-season €25 Passport, often same-week slots. Fountains are off, but the layout still impresses.
• ⚠️ Busy: April through October, peak summer especially. Expect crowds and the €35 high-season price.
• ❌ Avoid Tuesday — the Louvre is closed and visitors shift their Versailles day forward, making it the most crowded weekday. Saturday is the second-worst.

How to Get to Versailles from Paris

Versailles is about 22 kilometres south-west of central Paris. Public transport is the easiest way in; driving is not recommended because of traffic and limited parking. There are three reasonable train options, but for most travellers one is clearly the best.

• 🚆 RER C (recommended): take it to its terminus, Versailles Château Rive Gauche — 35–45 minutes from central Paris, then a flat 10-minute walk to the gates (the shortest of the three stations). Board at Saint-Michel Notre-Dame, Musée d’Orsay, Invalides, Pont de l’Alma or Champ de Mars. Make sure the platform sign reads “VICK” or “Versailles Château RG” — only one RER C branch reaches the palace. A Zone 4 ticket costs about €4–€5 one way; standard metro (t+) tickets do not work.
• 🚉 Transilien Line L from Saint-Lazare to Versailles Rive Droite — about 35 minutes, then a 15–20 minute walk. Often faster if you’re staying in the 8th, 9th, 16th or 17th.
• 🚊 Transilien Line N from Montparnasse to Versailles Chantiers — about 15 minutes, the fastest train, but the longest walk on arrival (around 18 minutes).

For a no-logistics option, full-day guided tours from Paris include round-trip coach transfer, a guided State Apartments tour and free garden time, usually €70–€120 per person. Private transfers from your hotel start around €80–€120 each way for up to four passengers — a good option for groups of three or more.

Practical Tips Before You Go

• 📱 Mobile tickets work fine. No printing required — but a screenshot of your QR code is a useful backup, as signal at the gates can be weak.
• ⏰ Book the earliest available slot. Crowds build by about 30% per hour after 10:00 am.
• 👟 Wear comfortable shoes. The marble floors are hard and you’ll easily walk 8–10 kilometres including the gardens.
• 🎒 Security is airport-level. Bags over 55 × 35 × 25 cm, suitcases, tripods, drones, selfie sticks and food are not allowed. There’s a small free cloakroom but no luggage storage.
• 🍽️ No proper restaurant inside. The cafés are mediocre and expensive — eat before you arrive or in Versailles town along Rue de Satory afterwards. Water is allowed.
• ♿ Accessibility: most of the main palace is reachable by elevator and adapted routes; visitors with disabilities and one companion enter free with priority access at Gate H.

A Brief History of Versailles

Versailles started as Louis XIII’s hunting lodge in 1623 — a modest brick-and-stone retreat about a day’s ride from Paris. His son, Louis XIV, transformed it: from 1661 the Sun King used the resources of the entire kingdom to make Versailles the most magnificent court in Europe, and in 1682 he moved the seat of French government there from the Louvre. For just over a century, every important decision in France was made inside these walls.

That ended on 6 October 1789, when a Parisian crowd marched on Versailles, entered the Queen’s Apartments by force, and made Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette return to Paris. They never came back. The palace was stripped of its furniture during the French Revolution and nearly demolished; Louis-Philippe saved it in the 1830s by turning it into a museum “to all the glories of France”, which is essentially what it remains today. UNESCO added Versailles to the World Heritage List in 1979.

Frequently Asked Questions